Performance analysis of incoherent multi-wavelength OCDMA systems under the impact of four-wave mixing.

In this paper, we comprehensively analyze the impact of four wave mixing (FWM) on the performance of incoherent multi-wavelength optical code-division multiple-access (MW-OCDMA) systems. We also consider many other interferences and noises, including multiple access interference, optical beating interference, and receiver noise, in the analysis. From the numerical results, we can find the power ranges of different MW-OCDMA systems, in which the impact of FWM is dominant and consequently results in an increase in the bit-error rate of the systems. We also find that the impact of FWM becomes more severe when the frequency spacing is small and/or dispersion-shifted fiber is used. In addition, we quantitatively discuss the impact of FWM on the number of supportable users and power penalty in the MW-OCDMA systems.